INDIA in F1

Author: David Bodapati

  • Our aim is to finish 6th at season-end: Andrew Green, Force India

    Hungarian GP

    FIA Press conference 2

    TEAM REPRESENTATIVES – Andrew GREEN (Force India), Rémi TAFFIN (Renault Sport), Martin WHITMARSH (McLaren), Toto WOLFF (Williams), Luiz Pérez Sala (HRT).

    Andrew, if I can start with you. First of all, who does Force India see as its rivals and where do you hope to be at the end of the season? What position? What are you targets?

    Andrew GREEN: Ultimately, everybody on the track is our rival. At the moment we would be targeting sixth position, that would be a realistic target for us. It’s going to be difficult. The cars in front of us are all very, very competitive. So it’s going to be a big ask and we’ll have to dig deep, as we always do, and we’ll be pushing like crazy right until the end. That’ll be the plan and we’ll see where we finishing. So far we’re in a position where we’re better than we were last year with respect to points and we’re reasonably happy with that. If every we score more and more points then ultimately we’re going to go up, so happy with that. But there are just some teams in front of us who have scored some big results and got on the podium and that’s put us behind them. It’s just a matter of chipping away at them and hopefully by the time we get to the end we’ll be just in front. That’ll be the plan.

     What about developments? What sort of developments can you envisage coming through?

    AG: It’s a tricky time. We brought our last big development to Silverstone. We didn’t really get a chance to evaluate it in the wet conditions. Beyond that it’s about optimising what we have and getting to know what we have and getting it to run at its peak. Development now really is turning to next year. For a team of our size we can’t afford to develop a car much beyond this point in the season. It’s really a case of trying to optimise what we have.

     That was going to be the next question, when does development shift to next year?

    AG: It started a while ago.

     So most thoughts from the design team are on that?

    AG: From about this time, yes, it has switched over.

     Rémi, first of all tell us about your role within Renault F1?

    Rémi TAFFIN: Basically, I’m just working on the track as Head of Operations, so whatever we deal with on engines on track I’m responsible for. Basically we have four teams we supply engines to, as you know, and I will make sure through a race weekend that we’ve got let’s say a crossover in between these teams to make sure the Renault engines are well used in any car but trying to keep the confidentiality that we must have.

     Obviously the great subject here is all about mapping. Can you explain to us what that means and when you change that how big a change is that? And how it is done.

    RT: We’re not talking about big changes. We’re talking about an ongoing process, which is obviously race after race you try to optimise your package and engine maps are part of that and that’s what we’ve been trying to do since the beginning of the year. When you talk about engine maps it’s something that is done by everyone in the pitlane. So that’s not something unusual.

     When we talking about it, we’re talking about software… someone has referred to it as a ‘gizmo’. Can we explain that?

    RT: Let’s take the example of the engine map we’ve been talking about. It’s basically what the engine is able to produce as torque during the weekend, for example here. And that’s where is the bulk of the part to play with in Renault engines. That’s what shape… what we have got as torque in the car.

     And when it comes to Red Bull – how much of a change in performance would that have been, that was caused by that change.

    RT: It’s very difficult to quantify, but let’s have, say, a scale: we’re talking about hundredths and not at all about seconds or tenths. We all know that every bit on the car we’re going to be working [on it] to get the hundredth out, so that’s part of the job.

     Martin, obviously you’ve had an update recently but how much has that been affected by the weather. We’ve had a wet Silverstone, a wet Hockenheim and now we have we weather here. How much has development been affected?

    Martin WHITMARSH: Well, it’s certainly difficult now that we don’t test. If you bring a whole package of upgrades to the car, on Friday morning P1 typically we have our only test session and if it’s wet then it rather handicaps that test. It’s been difficult. I think we’ve made some progress and we will continue to do so. We had a reasonably big package of upgrades in Germany and we have a few bits and pieces here as well. You’ll do what you can. We’ve had a remarkable run of run of rain in the practice sessions so far this year. It would be nice to get some steady, dry conditions where the engineers can work more easily. But it’s the same for everyone. Everyone, to varying degrees, is trying to develop and improve the car and that’s part of the challenge. Sometimes you’ve got a great data set and you can go forward with confidence and other times you have to make a decision on a limited data set and in some ways that’s more interesting. The engineers don’t like it but it’s more interesting when you have to take a bit of a flyer.

     You must have been really pleased with the way those worked in Germany for Button particularly in the race but obviously Lewis a little bit as well and Lewis fastest in both sessions today?

    MW: Yeah, you’re not pleased until you’re scoring maximum points. I think we’ve made some progress. But this year has been a very difficult to predict championship, it’s been tyre dominated. Those who work the tyres… you can work very hard on your car but if you can’t turn the tyres on then you’re in trouble. We’ve seen that a few times on our car – too often – and we’ve seen it on a few other cars. That’s a great challenge for everyone. I think it’s going to be a very exciting championship. You’ve got to say Fernando and Ferrari have done a great job to be where they are, but there are still 430 on the board, to be taken, and I’m sure ourselves, Red Bull, all these teams here will be trying our best to pull back that advantage.

    Jenson’s had a bit of a difficult time recently – you must have been really pleased with the way he bounced back in Germany?

    MW: Yes, of course. If you are a racing driver and a racing driver in a team like McLaren or Ferrari, you’re going to come under quite a lot of scrutiny. It’s very different, you can turn up as a rookie in some other teams and there’s pressure because you’re in Formula One but I think if you’re in McLaren, whoever you are, same if you’re in Ferrari, year in, year out, if you’re not qualifying on the front two rows of the grid then there’s quite a large enquiry afterwards and all sorts of pressure ensues. I think Jenson hasn’t lost his skills, he’s had one great win this year, he’s very, very fit and very, very committed and I was delighted for him that he’s back on form and I’m sure he’ll be strong this weekend.

    Toto, first of all, you have a new position within the Williams team, what does that involve?

    Toto WOLFF: Formally, I have a new title. Actually the position is not quite new, I have been doing the same job for a couple of months already after Adam’s departure. It involves basically helping Frank in the daily job running the team.

    You’re an investor in the team as well as holding this new position. Where do you see the team in five years’ time? What’s your plan to take it forward?

    TW: My approach, kind of changed. I was an investor before, which is the easier part – you can criticise and stick your nose in everywhere. Now formally I’m an official employee of the company – at least I work for the company – so I have to deliver as well, I’m part of the team. Where do I see the team? When I joined in 2009 I gave myself a five year period to progress. Now this is a random period, it just sounded OK for me. We have won a race this year, which came quite early, maybe earlier than expected, but I think the team is on-track technically and on-track setting all the other commercial departments as well.

     

    And to have this commitment, you must have a vision for the sport as a whole as well. How do you see the sport progressing?

    TW: The sport, Formula One, is still the biggest or largest global sports platform in the world and it’s growing, it growing healthy and successfully. Obviously you can always try to change and optimise things but it’s a fantastic platform worldwide and this was the basic concept behind getting involved in a Formula One team.

     

    Luis, the team seems to have made some improvements – how do you see that progress?

    Luis PÉREZ-SALA: We are quite happy, I am quite pleased because the start of the season was very, very difficult; to have the car ready was almost a goal. And then, from the first race where we did not qualify, we have been improving the team. We have new headquarters since April 1st in Madrid. The race team is already working on, I will say, getting used to the races and we still need to grow the team on the design and the aero side.

     

    How is that expansion coming on from the team point of view? And also, from an economic point of view how easy is it to expand the team in that area?

    LP-S: The problem is when you are short in economic… no, in the budget – we have maybe the lowest budget of any Formula One team – you need more time to grow because you cannot do whatever you want. You have to be careful – but I think we have enough to make a good team and to stay. That’s why we are here. We try to improve but we have to be realistic. And it is going to take time for us.

     

    Is recruitment fairly easy for you? Are you looking worldwide for recruitment, for engineers, for design people? How easy is it to get people to come to work in Madrid?

    LP-S: It’s not difficult, it’s one of the advantages of the crisis I would say: you have more people on the market and we can find them. The problem is that it’s not easy to find the good people to work for HRT. Sometimes it’s not easy to find who are just the key persons. But we are there, we are having a lot of interviews and slowly, slowly we are growing. We are hiring people. And even if we want to keep it as a small team, I think if we optimise our research, we can improve our performance and be closer to the front rows.

     

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

     

    Q: (Heinz Pruller – Honorary) Toto, we know you were a great racing driver yourself. Is there any plan for you to drive the Formula One Williams for fun, off-season or somewhen?

    TW: As you know, I was more ambitious than talented and there is no ambition to drive a Formula One car because it would just look ridiculous, I think.

    Q: (Heinz Pruller – Honorary) Because Walter Wolf, who once bought the Williams team, he tried himself and it was a kind of a disaster.

     

    Q: (Heinz Pruller – Honorary) Martin, we know you wanted to become an aeronautist once, a while ago. Now we have an Austrian guy, Felix Baumgartner who wants to break the (extreme sky diving) world record. Have you heard about him?

    MW: Yes. Firstly, it was a long time ago that I was involved in aeronautics. I think they’ve moved on since the bi-plane! I think any challenge that you set yourself in sports, in technology, I think are always exciting. I think anyone who is brave enough to try and do these things are often considered nutty by many but I think that that’s the sort of thing that drives humans on, that feeling of endeavour and that passion to try and do something that’s not been done before.

     

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – The Citizen) Luis, in the previous press conference in Hockenheim, Norbert Haug and John Booth admitted that their teams hadn’t yet signed any form of Concorde or commercial agreement for 2013 onwards. Where does your team stand in that regard at the moment?

    LPS: We have not already signed anything.

     

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – The Citizen) Remi, as you said earlier on, you supply four teams with engines, yet only one was called in by the stewards last Sunday. This sort of implies that the other three were left out of the gizmo, if I can call it that. What is your customer policy regarding these sort of devices or technical developments?

    RT: I think we can make this simple. We’ve got our engine with this map in a certain way. We’ve got an area in which to play which we call the ballpark and each of our four teams is able to chose between these things so they are free to play with our engine as they wish, let’s say, and that’s the way they do and they did, so maybe that’s why we got one team that has gone to that in Hockenheim and there could have been another one one race after.

     

    Q: (Joe Saward – GP Special) You’re all movers and shakers to a certain extent in Formula One, but all of you have to answer to bosses. Can you explain how frustrating that is sometimes when you’re there running racing teams and you have to answer to people who perhaps don’t have as good a grasp as you do?

    MW: Well, certainly my chairman has a phenomenal grasp of this sport. He’s been around in it for a while. I have to report to the board from time to time but I don’t find it frustrating. I think it’s good. If your owners don’t have any interest, initially that’s fun but it becomes a bit disheartening if they don’t have a passion to speak their mind and express an opinion. We don’t always agree with them but that’s part of the fun.

    TW: Are you sure you would like me to comment? My only boss is my wife! My partner is Frank (Williams) so I can live with that situation.

    LPS: For me that’s very easy: I ask and they don’t give! No, we are close, we are quite close. We know that it’s a long term commitment and we know that we need time and they understand that, even if we sometimes only take one place – like in Hockenheim, we overtook one car. For us it makes all the team happy. Sometimes it’s very easy, it’s even better than for some other teams to get third position or fourth position.

     

    Q: (Christian Nimmervoll – Motorsport – Total.com) Martin and Toto, in recent years it has become more and more difficult to predict driver performance on a long term basis because of tyres, because of regulation changes and so on, yet there is a trend that driver contracts are signed more and more long term. Isn’t there a contradiction in that?

    MW: I think that if you don’t sign long term contracts with drivers it becomes a big point of discussion and distraction for most of the season. I think the driver is still an important component fortunately in this sport and I think people like to have some stability there. I don’t think there’s a contradiction. I think that the drivers have to manage tyres, probably much more so than they have done for a long period of time. They’ve got to work in the team, they’ve got to work with the drivers, they’ve got to motivate those people around them. They make a big contribution. We don’t always tell them that when we’re negotiating with them but that happens to be the case.

    TW: The driver is an essential part, I think, today, probably you can’t really see the performance of the car because of the driver. If you look at junior formulae on equal formats there’s big differences and the development we have seen in Formula One, with economics playing a larger role, we are probably having a similar situation, so it’s all about developing your own drivers and trying to keep the ones who are good in your car, so it’s as challenging as building a good car and getting a good engine to keep a good driver in the car, and build the best ones for the future.

     

    Q: (Matt Coch – pitpass.com) Martin, there’s been this Tooned cartoon happening. Has there been a measurable difference; are you deliberately going after the younger demographic with that one? I know it’s Ron’s baby.

    MW:  Again, I think McLaren has changed a little bit over the last few  years and I’m sure some things are not so good and hopefully we do some other things… I think Formula One is, as Toto said… there are two great world sports: soccer and Formula One. We are investing in the future. We see that it’s important to try and bring younger demographics, as you put it; I think also for McLaren to demonstrate that we’re not taking ourselves so seriously.  We’re still very serious about motor racing, we still want to win and we do everything we can, but I think you also have to show a slightly lighter side. We’ve shown two episodes, as you may know, there’s going to be an episode accompanying every Grand Prix this year and hopefully people enjoy it, it’s a little bit of a light-hearted moment for three minutes before each Grand Prix and I think we’ve had a tremendously positive response to it. I think the followers, after only two episodes have exceeded our expectations. I think it’s not just good for McLaren, it’s good for the sport. I think it just lightens it up, makes it something that… We’ve got to buy more people into the sport. This sport is fundamentally a great great sport. The more you understand, the more you get involved in it, the greater it is. We’ve got to now try and sell that proposition to as broad an audience as we can and Tooned, the McLaren animation, is part of that process.

     

    Q: (Dieter Rencken – The Citizen) According to the sporting regulations, the closing date for entries to the 2013 championship was the 30th of June. Did your teams all enter? And what happened to those entries?

    MW: I believe all teams entered but the FIA has re-defined the entry time at the moment, so I presume all of the teams will re-enter within the new time frame.

    LPS: The same.

    TW: We entered.

     

    Q: (Vanessa Ruiz – ESPN Radio) Toto, as soon as your position was confirmed or you got your new title at Williams, speculation started about the driver line-up because of your work with Valtteri Bottas. How do you see his situation at the moment – also because we are approaching August, so do you understand that he’s ready to occupy a seat at Williams or is it not yet time. And also, do you see a conflict of interest because of your new title and the fact that you work with him as a manager?

    TW: Very interesting question. It’s definitely a conflict of interest; this is why, at the beginning of the year – actually last year already – I have refrained from interfering in any kind of negotiations or discussions between the team and Valtteri’s management group, so my role is a pure financial investor behind Valtteri. He’s managed by Didier Coton who is doing the day-to-day job and we’re having – to use banking language – Chinese walls. Emotionally, of course, I saw Valtteri for the first time in Formula Renault 2000 here at the Hungaroring in 2008 so he’s a boy I have followed for quite a long time and he’s a friend, as is Pastor, and as is Bruno. Luckily I’m a shareholder in the team and I have a five percent commission on Valtteri’s contract so I think that shows how the balance would go if it was only about the economics. So the point is that it’s very clear that the team is going to take decisions on the best package of driver and hopefully it’s all going in a direction that we can have the quickest in the car.

     

    Q: (Christian Nimmervoll – Motorsport – Total.com) Following up on Dieter’s question regarding the deadline, does that mean that the entries were rejected or what’s been the formal answer from the FIA?

    MW: The FIA has asked us to re-submit our entries at a later date

    Q: (Joe Saward – Grand Prix Special) Toto, in your new position, obviously there’s more responsibility on a day-to-day basis. Does that mean we’re going to see you moving to England and going into the office every day and taking over Adam (Parr’s) chair?

    TW: Yeah, that has been quite an issue actually, to discuss that. We have been negotiating on how many days per week I have to spend in England, but it’s very easy. I like England a lot, staying in Oxford which keeps me young, it’s a student city. I must be careful now about putting myself in shit! Obviously my wife is Scottish so she enjoys being there as well. The answer is yes, I’m going to spend more days at the factory and I enjoy it, it’s what I want to do now.

     

    Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto, Motor und Sport) Toto, as Remy Taffin was explaining, there are many mapping possibilities in the Renault shop which you could take. Why didn’t you take the one which Red Bull has chosen in Germany, because it looks like it’s a quite interesting one?

    TW: First of all, flattening out torque curves is something that every team looks at, obviously, and the reason why we have not been taking up that solution is because we didn’t make it work as Red Bull have. We have no coanda exhaust and this is why it’s not as beneficial for us as maybe for others.

     Ends

     

  • For HRT, everything is under one roof & impressive now: Karthikeyan

    Thursday FIA Press conference

    DRIVERS – Narain KARTHIKEYAN (HRT), Kamui KOBAYASHI (Sauber), Heikki KOVALAINEN (Caterham), Kimi RAIKKONEN (Lotus), Fernando ALONSO (Ferrari), Pastor MALDONADO (Williams)

    Narain, tell us how HRT has changed in the last six months. How much has it changed and developed? 

    Narain KARTHIKEYAN: Yeah, I think we’ve come a long way since Australia and the team has a permanent facility now and the factory is very impressive. Everything has come under one roof. There’s a design office, we’re hiring a lot of people and the car is getting slightly better. It’s a positive step and hopefully this will continue throughout the season. We have some upgrades coming during the holidays and hopefully we’ll start using them soon and close the gap. The car at the moment is similar to the Marussia, but we can improve still a little bit and that’s what we are planning to do.

    It’s an unfortunate fact that you do see a lot of blue flags in your position. Tell us how difficult it is from that point of view, and how much your race is compromised by that? How much do you have to race in the first quarter of the race?

    NK: Yes, that part where you don’t have the blue flags in the first of the race is where you try and do what you can and push. But after that, yes, once the blue starts coming you have to go offline sometimes and you pick up lots of marbles and after that it’s managing the tyres and so on. It’s quite difficult for us but we try to stay out of the way of the leaders.

    Kamui, your best performance in Hockenheim: in fact a fantastic performance from both Sauber cars. Have you sorted out the problems you had in the past few races?

    Kamui KOBAYASHI: I think it’s not really a big problem. It’s basically that we had speed everywhere but unfortunately we missed some piece of the puzzle and we could not compete at the end of the weekend, in the race. We believe we had a really good car and had good performance but we just need to piece together all the puzzle. Yeah, I think otherwise we are not worried about our pace. For sure it’s not the best of the car but for sure we can fight for good positions.

    Is there a problem with qualifying? If you started further up perhaps you could be a winner?

    KK: Definitely. In Hockenheim I had quite good confidence in the dry but unfortunately in the wet, especially on the inter tyre in that situation in Hockenheim qualifying, we struggled a lot to warm them up. I think a lot of drivers struggled but we struggled as well and that is the point – if it had been dry I think we could quite easily have found Q3 and then I think the race would have been completely different. This is what we need. Unfortunately in the last two races we had a wet qualifying and a little bit of a difficult time. In the dry we definitely have a good car. In the wet, sometimes it’s good, sometimes not good. It’s difficult to say what is the clear answer [to that]. We show a really good car in the dry and we definitely we see in the factory many people are working so hard and we see really good performance in the car and so thanks to all the guys working on the car.

    Heikki, a lot of rumours going around the paddock at the moment about where you might be going etc. What can you tell us?

    Heikki KOVALAINEN: I think it’s the time of the season where you hear a lot of rumours regarding a lot of drivers, and for me nothing has changed at the moment. The only focus is improving our team and our car, and making the best out of what we’ve got. Then at some point we’ll sit down with my management and sit down with Caterham first and then see what we’ll do for the future.

    You’re a previous winner at this circuit. What are you feelings coming into this race?

    HK: Pretty similar feelings to any other grand prix. It’s too long since I won here. It’s just one weekend in the whole championship. Of course, as a Finn this feels a little bit like a home grand prix. We have a lot of people from Finland always turning up here. In that way it is perhaps a warmer feeling through the weekend than some of the races. But apart from that, it’s business as usual.

    Kimi, presumably you feel the same way about the crowd, but what about the car. Is it progressing? People were talking about it as a winner earlier this season. Is it keeping up that reputation? Is it keeping that performance?

    Kimi RAIKKONEN: Well, it hasn’t won any races, so it’s not a winner. I mean, we have a good package but for many races we probably haven’t got the best out of it in all conditions at all races but that’s up to us. We are still pretty happy but of course you want to do better. We wish to win races but it hasn’t happened so far, so hopefully we can win some this year. It’s not easy and we know that. We keep trying to improve things and learn from the things that we do and we’ll see what we can do in the second part [of the season].

    Is fourth the best you can do at the moment and is qualifying an emphasis for you?

    KR: We had a good speed last weekend, apart from the rain. We couldn’t get anything in the rain for some reason. That really put us in a not very good position. If it’s a dry weekend… the car has been good in the wet in Silverstone but for some reason not in qualifying in the last race. I think we’re finding the place where I want to be with the car and the set-up and things like that and hopefully we can be a bit better here than we were last week.

    Fernando, since last weekend, you and Felipe felt the moral obligation to visit earthquake victims very close to the factory at Maranello. Can you tell us of that experience: what you found, what you saw?

    Fernando ALONSO: yeah, we were visiting some of the camps that still have people there and it’s not clear when they will come back home, because some of the cities are still quite damaged and most of the buildings will still need some repair. For sure, it’s not an easy situation. A sad feeling a little bit. We tried to give them some support from the Ferrari factory and all the team. When the earthquake arrived everyone cares about these people and they were in the news everyday, but now after a few months or whatever, people tend to forget, so we were just visiting them to give them full support and to wish that everything will become better and better every day and that normality will arrive sooner rather than later.

    You’ve come into this race obviously having won last weekend, you won your first race here and you’ll go into the break leading the Championship. Do you see yourself as favourite to win the Championship and, if not, who is?

    FA: Well, I think we are in a good position in terms of points that we achieve in the first half of the season, in the first ten races, but we are, as you said, only half. We did ten and there remain another ten important races with the same possibilities for everybody. I think the distance between the top five, top six is not a distance or a gap that is impossible to recover. You just need one good race or two good races and you are up there. So, we need to keep the concentration, try to keep maximising what we have in our hands every weekend – sometimes we know that can be a podium, sometimes maybe it’s a fifth position, sometimes a seventh, but we cannot afford to make any mistakes or anything that we will regret. So, we need to keep doing good – some good consistency but in terms of the Championship it’s obviously way to early to think and still McLaren, Red Bull, Lotus, Mercedes – anyone is in contention at the moment.

    Pastor, obviously you won in Barcelona: what has changed, what has happened since then – you really haven’t followed that up. What’s happened since then.

    Pastor MALDONADO: Yeah, I think after Barcelona, for whatever reason we didn’t consolidate our results. I did a couple of mistakes and then I’ve been a bit unlucky as well at the same time. We’ve been working so hard in the team, trying to keep our performance. Maybe in qualifying we did a great job and as I mentioned, for whatever reason we haven’t been very strong on races. Now in the second part of the Championship we are looking to recover the points we lost and to every time be strong and the strongest.

    What about this circuit? You were very quick in Monaco, there are mid-speed corners just like in Barcelona as well. Is this looking a good circuit for you?

    PM: Yeah, I hope so. For sure now the gaps are very close and I hope to have a great car here. It’s going to be very important to understand the tyres, to understand and to prepare the car for quali and the race – which is a compromise I think here. And yeah, I love this circuit. It’s very technical, very hard mentally and physically and for sure looking forward to have a great result and to be back to the points again with the team.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    (Dan Knutson – Honorary) Fernando, in Germany you told us how much better the car was. Could you expand a bit? Just how much has it improved since Jerez testing and what race was the biggest update?

    FA: Well, definitely we did improve the car a lot. I don’t know how much, or I cannot quantify it in terms of lap time because it will be difficult. I think between two and three seconds maybe but obviously it’s a number that cannot be very precise. I think the biggest improvement that we introduced was in Barcelona; the biggest updates were mainly the aerodynamics of the car – but we knew that in the first three or four races, when we were in China, Bahrain, the car was not doing what we were expecting. And when we arrived in Barcelona, everything became a little bit more normal for us and from that point, all the updates it was fine-tuning. But the Barcelona one was to make everything back to work.

    (Péter Farkas – Autó-Motor) Kimi, we have not really heard anything about the infamous power steering lately. Have you and the team taking a step forward regarding that? And before, did you have any real life situations  where you felt you couldn’t achieve a better result because of the power steering?

    KR: There’s no point to talk about it because I mean, when we say something people try to make a massive story out of it. Like I always said, it’s not perfect – it’s still not – it’s improved a lot since we started. But still a way to go. It’s OK to race, it’s not like it’s somehow going to make me one second faster or half a second faster if we going to get it exactly as we want. And this is… I know that I’ve driven better ones and there’s definitely still things that we can improve. We’re working for it, but it’s not the easiest thing to get right. So we have to work on those and hopefully at some point we will get it exactly as we want.

    (Harry Kiner – ARA Radio) Fernando, for you two questions please. In Ferrari team I heard they call you a maestro: is it true and how does it come? And managed to stay out of any trouble this year – how to you do it?

    FA: In Ferrari they call me Fernando normally. But always with Ferrari as we are already repeating it was a very good reception, welcome from day one. And it’s like family for me. I’m in Italy 80 per cent of my free time and I have my best friends there working also in Italy now in the factory in the road cars, so I spend free time there. Most of the time as I said I’m better in Italy even than in Spain, so this is something for sure curious.

    This year it has been not easy to go out of problems or troubles in the races because the grid is so tight, so in one-tenth you have four or five cars. In the races we are more or less at the same performance, it’s not like last year when there were six cars and then a different group of cars and then a different group again. This year every detail counts, every pitstop counts, the starts… so I think it’s a little bit more stress on the grid or between all of us, so we’ve been lucky in some moments of the Championship, in some manoeuvres, in some incidents and we’ve been finishing all the races in the points, which obviously helps for us. We obviously need to keep doing like this and hopefully have the whole season trouble-free.

    (Adrian Huber – Agencia EFE) Fernando, your figures keep improving: nine years ago you won here your first race and last Sunday you won your 30th. Back nine years, did you imaging you will get all this? What were your feelings then?

    FA: No, no, definitely not. When you win your first grand prix it’s just a lot of emotions going on. A lot of satisfaction, proudness of the team, of yourself, or family… a lot of thoughts are coming when you win your first grand prix. You cannot imagine that you will repeat that feeling or that happiness more times or very often. So when you keep winning after some years, some different teams, different regulations that have changed a lot from 2003 obviously: V10, V8… Michelin, Bridgestone, Pirelli, refuelling, no refuelling. It has been a lot of time since 2003. If I look back obviously, for sure I never imagine to have the luck and the possibility to achieve the two World Championships and now driving for Ferrari.

    Q: (Gabor Joo – Index) Kimi and Fernando; Red Bull have these new engine mapping rules for this weekend. Do you expect Red Bull to struggle a bit?

    FA: I think it’s a question for Red Bull.

    KR: I don’t know what they’re doing so we will see.

    Q: (Livio Oricchio – O Estado de Sao Paulo) Kimi, when you look back at the two years that you were out of Formula One, do you think they have had any influence in your performance up to now? And what happened when you were leaving Hockenheim? We saw some pictures (of him tripping over a barrier he was trying to climb over)…

    KR: I almost fell down. It was close!

    I was two years out (of Formula One). I was doing different things and I don’t think that if I’d been driving two years in Formula I would be any different really. I maybe took a few practices, a few races to know everything exactly (when I came back). Of course it’s a new team, so it took a bit to get to know everybody there and to get everything exactly as I wanted, but I think we’re getting there now and it hasn’t been too bad really. It’s been OK.

    Q: (Heikki Kulta – Turun Sanomat) Kimi, what is the maximum to be achieved with Lotus in the Constructors’ and Drivers’ championships and which one is more important for you?

    KR: I will tell you at the end of the year. We will try to do the maximum all the time. I don’t know where we’re going to end up. We’re doing pretty OK now. I think they didn’t probably expect us to do so well as a team at the beginning of the year, and we try to improve and hopefully we will manage to do that. We’re in the fight for the top three. We’re now fourth in the team championship and I’m fourth in the drivers. We go race-by-race and on my side try to score as many points as I can, and try to help the team… I guess they want to be as high as they can in the team championship. For me I want to be as high as I can from my side. Both things really influence each other so we will just try to do better and hopefully manage to do that.

    Q: (Ian Gordon – The Times) Fernando, it’s incredible to think that it’s six years since your last drivers’ title. A couple of points more in those years and you could have had four or five titles at the moment instead of two. What will it mean to you to win that third title if you do so this year, for yourself and for Ferrari? It will put you in a higher band of elite drivers, the Laudas and the Prosts.

    FA: Well, I think we need to wait and see when we have real possibilities of fighting for this championship. At the moment, as we said, we are happy with the points achieved in the first half but we need to keep working hard, we need to keep consistency and we need to keep doing good results. This can change very quickly, in two or three races and then we talk about very different things. Not much point to talk about the championship now. But as I said, when we finished Brazil in 2006, it was a dream for me to (even think to) win three World Championships in my career. If it’s this year, in two years’ time or in six years’ time, I don’t know but the third one will be very important for me. To have the same as Ayrton had – three World Championships – he was idol or my reference when I was in go-karts and some big names, as you said, Lauda etc so three is a pretty good number which I always dream of, and hopefully arrive sooner rather than later.

    Q: (Carlos Miguel – La Gaceta) Fernando, do you believe the new map rules could be good for Ferrari, because maybe Red Bull is slower with these new rules?

    FA: As we said before, it doesn’t change anything for us. We will have exactly the same car as Silverstone or Germany and for them, we have no idea. I think they are having their press conference at four, so it’s more a question for them.

    Q: (Alexander Hoffstatter – Austrian Press Agency) The Olympics are going to start tomorrow; do you like the idea of an Olympic Formula One race or is it just not realistic?

    HK: I suppose you think I’m the nice man who will give you the answer. I don’t think it’s realistic but why not? I have nothing against it but how do you fit a race track in an Olympic Games? I don’t know. But who knows? Why not?

    Q: (Adrian Huber – Agencia EFE) Fernando, at the very beginning of the year, you took the role of cheering up the people in your team. Do you have to calm them down a little bit now, or does everybody know how it’s going to go?

    FA: People know, certainly, what is our performance, how many points we have, how we achieve these points, how many points we have in the Constructors’. Every race, when you do the analysis after each Grand Prix the numbers never lie, so we know what we have.

    Q: (Andrea Cremonesi – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Fernando, it seems that this is the best season so far for you. How can you explain this? It is not only about the car, of course, but even yourself; have you changed something? Did your Malaysia victory mean that you changed something in the season?

    FA: No. Well… I think so far the results have been coming good and as I said, we’ve been lacking at some moments some details of the weekend and we have achieved a lot of points. I think I’ve had a very good season, like 2008, winning two races with Renault. 2009 with a car that normally my teammate was out in Q1, I was on the podium, things like that. In 2010, when I arrived at Ferrari, you always asked me if that was my best season, recovering until I arrived in Abu Dhabi leading the championship with that car, and last year you were saying that it was my best season with ten podiums in a car that was quite far from Red Bull and McLaren. And this year, at the moment, you are asking me good things but as I said before, if I have some or three races with some poor results, you will ask me why I’m not concentrated or something like that, so I will always try to do the best I can. I’m pretty happy with my last four or five seasons in Formula One, especially this one because at the moment we are taking care of all the details that seem to be quite important in this championship, because as I said before, the grid is so tight so you need to be close to perfection, let’s say, every weekend. If not you lose more positions than in the past but apart from that, it’s more or less the same performance so same approach, same preparation as the last four or five seasons.

    Q: (Harry Kiner – ARA Radio) A question for all of you, except Fernando; do you think that Fernando’s going to make it this year?

    NK: I think Fernando is going very well, yes, he has all the support, so I think he should make it.

    KK: The championship? I think Fernando is definitely the strongest this season. We can see he’s really strong. I think he will do it.

    HK: Fernando is definitely in the best position, but I think it’s too close to call at the moment. I think it’s going to be an exciting end to the season for everyone, not only for the teams, the drivers but also for the spectators.

    KR: Fernando is definitely in the best position right now, but like he said himself, you have one or two bad weekends and somebody else suddenly does well in those races and it changes very quickly. There are too many races to go, still, to look into it too much but then we will see what will happen at the end of the last race.

    PM: Yeah, Fernando has been really consistent and strong this year, this half season. For sure, he’s in the best place. I really wish him all the best for this season. He’s driving so well and all the best to him and the Ferrari team.

    Q: (Harry Kiner – ARA Radio) And again, to you all, are you going to watch the Olympics?

    NK: The Olympics? No, I’m going back to India.

    KK: I think I’m maybe going to see a few sports but I’m no big fan of the Olympics so I will just watch some of the results.

    HK: Regarding the Olympic Games, yes, absolutely, I will watching them as much as I can. We’ve got a good few Finnish athletes there. Probably the most interesting for myself is the mens’ javelin event. We’ve got a few guys who are not necessarily at the top in the rankings at the moment, but hopefully the timing of their fitness and preparation is good enough, so that they can snatch a medal. That would be great.

    KR: I think it’s hard to miss the Olympics even if you would like to. I will look at some on TV, but it’s not really sport that I’m following. For sure, there will be some TV so I will watch it.

    PM: I will just be supporting the Venezuelan team in the Olympics. I’m not that great a fan of the Olympic Games but for sure I will support the Venezuelan team.

    FA: Yeah, I think I will watch as much as I can, but obviously we are on holiday and if you go to the beach, you are not running to see the sport on TV. You see the replay in the evening or whatever

    Q: (Pablo Gorondi – Associated Press) Fernando, considering the streak you’ve been on in the past couple of weeks, we now have a month’s vacation coming up; are you afraid that this is going to disrupt the way things have been going for you? Or will you be able to take it up again at the end of the month?

    FA: Well, we considered the August break this year to be a little bit longer than normal and a good opportunity to catch some of the quickest cars, because more time is available for us. We think that we should find some extra performance that we are missing at the moment. So being a little bit late with the development of the car at the beginning of the season, being a little bit surprised in a bad way about the performance of the car at the beginning of the season, we need time and we need solutions to make the car faster and I think to have a longer period can only be good news for us.

    Q: (Dorel Tant – MSSport1.com) Heikki, would you be tempted to rally a car like Kimi Raikkonen?

    HK: You are always tempted, yes, but as we saw with Kimi, it’s not so easy, especially to go straight into it at World Rally level, to the top. I think the expectations would need to be zero. It would be purely for fun, it would take a long time to achieve any level of competitive performance. At the moment, all my focus is on Formula One. I feel that since a few years now, my career is more back on track. I feel better here so at the moment, not even for a hobby am I considering rallying. Every effort is now to improve the results in Formula One. Maybe when I get grey and old I will buy an Escort Mk2 and rally at home, but that’s just for fun.

    Ends  

  • Red Bull escapne without sanction

    Hockenheim, 22 July 2012: After deliberation on Sunday morning, stewards at Hockenehim have decided to allow Red Bull Racing to compete without sanction in the German Grand Prix.

    Having discovered torque output irregularities in car numbers 01 (Sebastian Vettel) and 02 (Mark Webber), FIA Formula 1 Technical Delegate Jo Bauer referred the matter to the stewards. Bauer’s report said:

    “Having examined the engine base torque map of car numbers 01 and 02 it became apparent that the maximum torque output of both engines is significantly less in the mid rpm range than previously seen at other Events.
    In my opinion this is therefore in breach of article 5.5.3 of the 2012 Formula 1 technical regulations as the engines are able to deliver more torque at a given engine speed in the mid rpm range.

    “Furthermore this new torque map will artificially alter the aerodynamic characteristics of both cars which is also in contravention of TD 036-11. I am referring this matter to the stewards.”

    Three hours after Bauer’s report was released the FIA Stewards of the Meeting announced no further action would be taken. Their statement read:

    “The stewards received a report from the FIA Technical Delegate, along with specific ECU data from Red Bull Racing Cars 1 and 2. The Stewards met with the team representatives and the representative of the engine supplier Renault.

    “While the stewards do not accept all the arguments of the team, they however conclude that as the regulation is written, the map presented does not breach the text of Art. 5.5.3 of the Formula One Technical Regulations and therefore decided to take no action.”

    ends

  • For Pirelli, Hockenheimring is a trip into the unknown

    Hockenheim, 19 July 2012: As the 2012 Formula One season hits its mid-point, round 10 of the championships sees the teams head for the German Grand Prix and the Hockenheimring, which returns to the calendar after its now traditional year off, says an FIA release.

    It’s been 10 years since a redesign saw the circuit change from a flat-out blast down two massive linked straights to a circuit offering perhaps a more complex challenge, although possibly a less viscerally exciting one

    Modern Hockenheim is a tricky race to set-up for. While the forest straights are gone, it’s still a relatively fast circuit and drivers will be on full throttle for upwards of 64% of the lap. The high-speed early part of the track, particular from turns two to six should call for a medium to lower downforce set-up but the circuit also features a tight stadium section where high downforce is needed, so a balancing act is required. Given the quick changes of direction encountered in the stadium section and through turns three and four, a stable car is also important.

    For F1 tyre supplier Pirelli, this is something of a trip into the unknown. The only recent experience it has of the track is from a GP3 race in 2010 and that weekend was often wet. As such the tyre company is bringing its medium and soft tyres, believing that the adaptable medium will cover most bases on a track defined by compromise.

    Five German drivers will start this weekend: Sebastian Vettel, Michael Schumacher, Nico Rosberg, Timo Glock and Nico Hulkenberg. Of the five, only Schumacher has won here before (in 1995, ‘02, ‘04 and ‘06). All will be keen to put in good performances on home soil, though for Vettel, who has 100 Drivers’ Championship points, this weekend may be particularly important in his efforts to keep pace with championship leader Fernando Alonso (129 points) and second-placed Red Bull team-mate Mark Webber (116 points).

    eom

  • Double penalty for Maldonado

    Silverstone, 9 July 2012: Pastor Maldonado was hit with a double penalty by Silverstone race stewards after he collided with Sauber’s Sergio Pérez during the British Grand Prix on 8 July.

    Maldonado was running seventh on lap 12 when he came under pressure from Pérez who had climbed from 16th after making a good start. The Mexican attempted a move around the outside of the Williams but Maldonado lost control in trying to defend the position and knocked the Sauber out of the race. The Williams driver went on to finish 16th.
    After the incident a furious Pérez called for the Venezuelan to be hit with a stiff penalty.

    “First of all, before the race the FIA sent a bulletin saying you cannot defend your position twice,” he told Sky Sports. “Once the car behind has a front wing on your tyres, you cannot move again. He did that before the braking.

    “He just has no respect for other drivers.,” he continued. “It’s not a racing incident. It’s just the way he drives. I did this manoeuvre to Button and to Hulkenberg and they fight very hard but they leave the room. You cannot fight [with Maldonado], you cannot do anything. He is a very stupid driver.

    “Just look at the last races. He ruined Hamilton’s race [in Valencia], he ruined my race in Monaco by doing stupid things. I don’t understand why the stewards don’t take a serious decision with him. With Pastor they’re not doing anything that will teach him a lesson.”

    The FIA stewards reviewed the incident after the race and handed Maldonado the double penalty of a reprimand and a €10,000 euro fine.

    For his part, Maldonado said he had simply lost control of his car.
    “I tried to defend the place but on the entry when we were getting to the middle of the corner I just lost the rear,” he said. “I think the tyres were so cold, he tried to close my way, we were side-by-side so close, and when I had a little moment I just touched him with my rear tyre. Disappointing for him and me too because the race so far was going good, but this is racing.”

  • Mark Webber wins strategic race for Red Bull

    Silverstone, 8 July 2012: Mark Webber won a strategic British Grand Prix with a finely judged race that saw him take the lead in the last five laps.

    Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso was second, ahead of Webber’s team-mate Sebastian Vettel. Behind the top three Felipe Massa drove a strong race to fourth. The two Lotuses were fifth and sixth with Räikkönen outgunning Grosjean after the Frenchman ran a compromised race having pitted in the early exchanges. Michael Schumacher took seventh for Mercedes. Lewis Hamilton was eighth for McLaren after failing to make an impression on the race despite leading out-of-sequence for a short while. Bruno Senna was ninth for Williams and Jenson Button took the final point in the second McLaren, according to an FIA press release.

    Alonso had converted his pole position into a good lead at the start but Webber stalked him all the way. And with the Ferrari and Red Bulls running different strategies, Webber had the speed advantage when he needed it. He made his move on lap 48 of the 52. Alonso did what he could to defend but didn’t take any heroic measures – Webber was going through and both drivers knew it.

    Alonso started the race on the hard tyre, as did McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton, the rest of the top ten opted for the soft tyre. Alonso made a good start and retained the lead while Webber hung on to second and Michael Schumacher kept third. Felipe Massa slipped past Sebastian Vettel into fourth. Alonso and Webber pulled away while Schumacher held up the field. The hard tyre was plainly the better rubber today, and Alonso used it to good effect, sprinting away to establish a lead of several seconds in the first stint.

    Being delayed but unable to make an impression on Massa, Vettel pitted early, taking on the hard tyre on lap 11. On the fresh, hard rubber he put in a brace of quick laps and managed to steal two places when everything played out. “I used the momentum and got past Felipe and Michael at the same time,” said the German. “We brought the right strategy which brought us back – but you always have a little more on the tyres at the end. I was a little bit too far away to get Fernando at the end – but I’m very happy with third today.”

    The real interest was ahead of him as Alonso was reeled in by Webber. Running two hard tyre stints, Alonso had pulled out a lead of six seconds over Webber – but the Australian started to come back late in the race. He took his second stop before Alonso and, with fresh hard tyres versus old hard tyres began to close the gap. Alonso pitted for his mandatory set of soft tyres perhaps earlier than he would have liked. It maintained his lead but Webber ate up the four-second gap as the Ferrari struggled on the softs. Webber made a textbook pass with the DRS down the Wellington straight, emerging in front out of the Brooklands corner.

    “It’s still sinking in,” said the Red Bull Racing driver afterwards. “It’s a very special victory for the team, being from just down the road. Thanks to the team for doing a great job – and thanks to all the fans for sticking with us over the last few days…”

    Alonso didn’t seem too upset, he emerges from Silverstone still leading the Championship, albeit by a reduced margin. “We lost seven points to Mark but we gained on the rest of the field, so a pretty good Sunday for us,” he said. He now has 129 points to Webber’s 116, with Vettel third on 100. In the Constructors’ Championship Red Bull moved onto 216 points with Ferrari moving into second on 152.

    ends

  • Mark was much quicker in the last stint: Alonso

    Silverstone, 8 July 2012: Mark Webber of Red Bull Racing team, who overtook Fernando Alonso of Ferrari, towards the close and Sebastian Vettel, who finished third attended the fourth and final FIA press conference at the Santander British Grand Prix, the ninth leg of the F1 World Championship on Sunday. However, Alonso retains his top spot in the drivers’ championship.

    PODIUM INTERVIEWS (by Sir Jackie Stewart) 

    Mark you must be a very happy boy?

    Mark WEBBER: Yeah, thanks Jackie. I think it was a very interesting race. I thought at the start Fernando had very good pace. A bit of strategy here and there. Obviously, Fernando started on different tyres. But never gave up, kept pushing and it didn’t really work out for Fernando at the end. It was very, very close for him so we were there to capitalise. It’s a very, very special victory for the team, just down the road, a local team, so thanks to all the guys, It’s incredible for them. And for Renault another victory for them in the UK. So I’m very proud today. Thanks to all the fans for sticking with us for the past few days, it’s been incredible.

    Fernando I thought you were going to win the race. I won two British Grands Prix, you’ve won two British Grands Prix. It was pretty hot for a while.

    Fernando ALONSO: Yeah it was quite close today the victory. At the end in the last stint Mark was much quicker than us, and he deserved the win, so I congratulate him and congratulate the Red Bull team. But I’m very proud of the Ferrari recovery in the last few weeks and now we are fighting for the victory in the last three or four grands prix. So we’re heading in the right direction. As Mark said, thanks to all the fans. We had not so good weather during the weekend and they were cheering all the time for us. I hope they enjoyed the show today and see you all next year.

    And what about the championship? You’re still leading.

    FA: Yeah, still there. It’s the main target obviously for us. Today I think we lost seven points with Mark but we gained some extra points on the rest of the field. So I think it was a good Sunday in terms of championship points for us.

    Well done, Sebastian, a good race for you.

    Sebastian VETTEL: Yeah, it was an interesting one. The start was not so good, I lost a little bit and lost a position to Felipe. I had a tough fight with him in the beginning. I nearly got past but it was really, really close. It was fun but I didn’t get past. Then we brought the right strategy to come back, which turned to be the right thing but obviously later on you always have a little bit of extra on your tyres. All in all, very happy. Mark obviously deserved to win today. Very happy with the result for the team. Thanks to all the fans out there because I think it was quite horrible the last two days not just for us but especially for them but obviously the sun came out today and the British summer showed its best. So looking forward to coming back next year.

    PRESS CONFERENCE

    Mark, well done. Just how much satisfaction did that win give you?

    MW: Oh, a lot. I’ve had a few now which is nice but this one is taking a little while to sink in. It didn’t look like a spectacular race maybe between Fernando and I initially, but it was one. A little strategy involved as well, particularly with ourselves, pacing the stints on the tyres, working out if it’s going to be two or three stops and how the tyres would behave in the race. Fernando starting on a different tyre and I knew he would have to run a different compound towards the end of the race as we had got the harder [more difficult] tyre out of the way at the start. I thought in the first stint that Fernando had he was in very, very good shape to probably close the win out, but it came our way in the last stint and I am absolutely over the moon, absolutely rapt. For the team, it’s local here, Wings for Life, all the photos on the car, great initiative, all that stuff, it’s a real good story. The fans here this weekend have put up with some horrendous weather but we’ve had a beautiful dry British Grand Prix. There’ll be some long trips home tonight but overall I’m very proud today. It was a very special victory as I say. I managed to get Fernando in the last few laps which was very nice and we got the win from there.

    And the timing is right as well, with three races in four weekend before the break. That’s important?

    MW: Ah look, we have a lot of races this year as you know. Melbourne was important, as will Brazil be. I’ve got a couple of wins now and also some consistent results as well. But we know how tight it is. I see Kimi finished ten seconds behind with fourth or fifth place or whatever, so it’s tight. As we saw with Seb, he lost a little but of time in the first stint and that can be your undoing. Sometimes I’ve had some of that medicine and it makes it hard to come back from there. So in the end you’ve got to grab these ones with both hands and I was very keen to grab with both hands today. I had a single opportunity to pounce and I wasn’t going to let that slip.

    It seemed to be in the middle sector that you were particularly gaining on Fernando in those closing stages.

    MW: I think Fernando, with the front left tyre, if you lose balance around this place, that sector the speed is very, very high, it’s very hard for the driver to do something. I could see that when I arrived on Fernando, reasonably close I got to see where he was struggling with his car. It was obvious that he was pushing as hard as possible but the balance wasn’t with him. That’s when you’ve got to smell the blood and you’ve got to go for it.

    Fernando so close but so far. When you first saw everybody else’s tyres and you were pretty much on your own [on the soft] was that a worry?

    FA: Not really. As Mark said before or later he cars will mix again. You have to put for the first 14 or 15 laps the soft tyres or in the last 14 or 15, so it was a similar timed race at the end over 52 laps. So I was not worried. Probably the start was the biggest worry because with the hard compound you know the start is a little bit worse. We tried to defend the position there. After that we were controlling the race more or less OK until the last stint, we were now quick enough and when Mark arrived I think he overtook very easy and there was nothing we can do. I’m happy with the second place. Now obviously, ten minutes after the race there is a strange feeling of losing victory. But it’s the same 18 points you get if you are third and you overtake the guy in second on the last lap and you are so happy, so it’s the same second place but different feelings in this ten minutes but I’m sure in one hour’s time I will appreciate it much more.

    And in particular having the pace you had in Valencia as well. That’s two races in a row you’ve been leading the race.

    FA: Yeah it was good in Valencia the car and here on a completely different track with a lot of high-speed corners the car seemed to perform very well. Also a fantastic race from Felipe, finishing fourth, so happy with the improvements in the car. I think still there is a last step to close with these guys, maybe they are a little bit quicker in some conditions on some circuits, so we need to improve those.

    And an interesting battle with Lewis. It wasn’t actually for position but on the road.

    FA: Yeah, it was close. I was with new tyres so I had a pace advantage but you know the McLaren is quite quick on the straights, so I overtook him on the exit of the corner thanks to the tyres and then he overtook me again on the straight and it was a difficult moment of the race because if you have a little contact or something you can lose your front wing or whatever and your race is over. You need to be aggressive, you need to try to no lose too much time in those overtakings but at the same time being a little bit careful.

    Sebastian, obviously for a Red Bull a great day with you first and third and also confirmation again of the pace you had in Valencia.

    SV: Yeah, I think all in all it was a good day. Obviously happy for the team, the factory is just down the road. It’s more or less our home grand prix and therefore definitely special and I’m sure we’ll have some drinks tomorrow.

    And an interesting battle with a group of four of you in the early stages.

    SV: Yeah, the start was not too good to be honest, I lost a little bit too much. I had too much wheel slip and I could see the first row disappearing. It was quite tight and with Felipe he had a better start and I lost the position to him. And then I think it was down to turn four it was extremely tight. I tried to defend the position to Kimi who was right behind. I think I damaged the front wing a little bit. Not sure how bad it was. But it didn’t turn out to be a massive disadvantage. So from there I got stuck a little bit. Once I got close to get past Felipe but he did a very good job, he very hard but very fair, so I enjoyed that a lot and then we did the right thing coming in a little bit earlier and used to the momentum and got past both Michael and Felipe at the same time, which was good. I was just a little bit too far away to get Fernando at the end so just a little bit off that feeling he described – you’re close and you get that second place in the end. I’m sure if the race had been a little bit longer then it would have been different but that’s how it is, so I’m very happy with third today.

    QUESTIONS FROM THE FLOOR

    Q: (Dan Knutson – Honorary) Congratulations Mark. As you say this season will be nip and tuck but you have points every race but one, you’re the second guy to win twice – it must give you confidence that you’re going to be in the thick of this championship fight.

    MW: Absolutely, I’m not low on confidence at the moment. It’s going well. I think in Barcelona we didn’t help ourselves with the strategy in qualifying to put ourselves outside the Q3 by being too optimistic about the pace of the car for that Sunday afternoon. So, overall, so far so good. We will enjoy today’s result, really soak it up. That’s what’s important. You have to remember how hard we work for these results and tomorrow morning, it’s Hockenheim. That’s what it has to be about. I think it’s a long, long season. I’m not getting too fired up about any particular championship positions at the moment. But what is for sure is that I have a nice haul of points to keep going with. I’m not sitting on 20 points trying to start my campaign from here. So it’s going well so far.

    Q: (Leonid Novozhilov – F1 Life) Mark, you are in second place in the championship. Now you’re ahead of Sebastian Vettel by 16 points. Will  you continue to attack, or let Sebastian Vettel overtake you?

    MW: Yeah. I think at Hockenheim we will let Seb through! No, honestly, I will try to give your question some decent respect. Look, it’s a championship for all of us. I’ve had a good run in the last few races. Obviously Seb had a retirement when leading Valencia so that’s the way it’s been. I’ve been there to have two very special victories so far this year, albeit in different circumstances. As I say, I would rather have the points that I have than those that some other people have. I’m not looking at who is third, fourth, fifth. I am looking at the little guy next to me and he’s going well as well, so we need to keep pushing hard.

    Q: (Peter Windsor – ClarkSport)Fernando, a couple of questions: how much did being on pole influence your decision on tyre choice? I wondered whether there was an element of being conservative at the start because you were on pole.

    And secondly, your second stint, was the length of that defined by covering Mark? Could you have gone longer in a perfect world in that second stint and perhaps made more use of the tyre at that point?

    FA: I think tyre choice was a little bit determined by the pace we saw in FP3, the little dry running that we had. We felt more confident on the hards so it was our preferred choice today. And then, if at any point of the race it had rained and we put on intermediates you didn’t have to use the softs any more so it was a better combination of possibilities that the hard gave us today.

    And then the length of the stint? I think the second was quite close to the limit of the number of laps. Maybe we could have lasted a couple of extra laps in the first one.

    Q: (Livio Oricchio – O Estado de Sao Paulo) Fernando, this is more or less a similar question: when you stopped on the 37th lap, you had 15 laps ahead of you on the softer tyre. You did only 12 on the harder tyre at the beginning. Did you think you could finish the race in good conditions with the tyres.

    FA: No, I was confident in the tyres, to be honest, because Felipe used the soft tyre in the first stint and I think he did 14 laps, so 14 laps with maybe a heavy car in the first stint and we were 15 laps to the end with a light car. So we were quite convinced the softs were OK but they were a little bit slower, obviously a little bit too much understeer, so the balanced changed and killed the performance of the car a little bit and we were a bit too slow. We knew, more or less, that the soft was a little bit slower, so we needed to open up a gap in the first two stints when we were on different tyres to Mark and we knew that that gap was for sure getting closer and closer at the end when we put on the softs, and what we opened up at the beginning was not enough

    Q: (Livio Oricchio – O Estado de Sao Paulo) And for both Red Bull drivers, after the astonishing performance in Valencia, if it hadn’t have rained here, did you expect more from the car during the race?

    MW: Obviously we got some confidence with our car in Valencia. I think that before then, we’d been finding our way with the new regulations, but I think we understood a little bit more about the RB8 in Valencia, and that has been an on-going process here. Potential is an over-used word but we’ve got to try and get the most out of the car in all conditions. I think we’ve definitely improved the car from Barcelona, this is an even quicker circuit, and also what you have to keep in mind is if you’re a little bit out of the balance window here – not with the tyres but I mean balance chassis-wise –  aerodynamically around here you are in big big trouble, so we had to tune the car as everyone did, as the weekend went on. We learned a lot in P3, the only dry running we had, so I think we’re very happy with the car around here. Probably not had the advantage that we had in… obviously Seb had a clean Grand Prix. I was in a bit of traffic but Valencia was probably a bit stronger, but here we won the race. So it turned out OK. Fernando wasn’t slow, but I think the team’s done a great performance with the car here.

    Q: (Andrea Cremonesi – La Gazzetta dello Sport) Mark, this morning you told me that wet conditions would be better for you, given the temperature. Do you think that the temperature increase at the end affected your performance a little bit?

    MW: When I saw you this morning, we only had the (dry) running from P3, which, to be honest, wasn’t particularly smooth sailing for us. We had a look at what Fernando had done in that session and he looked very good on balance and his sectors were pretty strong, taking into account fuel loads or whatever, we thought Fernando looked pretty good, so we had that in mind, going into the race, obviously, how we would go. Don’t forget last year as well; he gave us a hiding during the Grand Prix as well through balance and overall high speed performance and grip, if you like, so Ferrari has always been pretty strong here, and Fernando as well. So in the end, a little bit surprised  that we were maybe as competitive as we were in the dry, but hey, it’s a great problem to have and we put together a great Grand Prix today.

    Q: (Sean McGreevy – CSMA Club Magazine) Mark, you’re consistently successful at Silverstone. What do you enjoy, what do you like about racing here?

    MW: Well, this morning I took the dogs for a run. The good thing about going home to them is that they don’t know if I’ve had a shit day or a good day, they’re always happy to see me. It’s good to be staying at home. All of us know how much we love hotels so it’s just good to be at home and even though it’s my job and it’s all sportsmen and women’s jobs to enjoy – whether you’re a golfer, tennis player, racing driver – you have to enjoy or get the most out of every venue that you race at but it’s only natural that there is… like Fernando in Barcelona, there is that extra little bit that makes you a little bit more relaxed and a bit more comfortable, which you try and replicate at every single Grand Prix, but with all due respect, it’s not the same at Hockenheim. I love racing everywhere but here it’s extra special. As I say, I won my first race here in ’96 in a Formula Ford so the love affair continues.

    Q: (Michael Schmidt – Auto, Motor und Sport) Sebastian, when you look at your lap times, you were OK in sector one and three, maybe even the fastest, but you were consistently lost out in sector two. What was the problem there?

    SV: I don’t know. I got told we lose a little bit too much in the second sector. We probably had a little bit of trouble in the fast stuff at the end of the race, so I think all in all we were quite competitive, but yes, we lost out in the second sector so we need to see why that was. Generally I felt pretty happy. In the last stint, to be honest, I wasn’t so happy with the car, I picked up a lot of vibrations. I don’t know why as I didn’t have a lock-up or anything. We need to have a look why that was. I have one question: does anybody have a clue about the tennis? What’s the score? Three all in the first set.

    Q: (Frederic Ferret – L’Equipe) Mark, you said that from the outside the race was not spectacular; what is the main difficulty for you during that race? Managing the tyres, the start, overtaking Fernando?

    MW: Yes, understanding the pace to do and to have the range to split the race evenly, for a two stop Grand Prix. That was the main focus, to make sure that I could get to the stop lap which the guys were trying to predict me to hit, which pit stop lap they wanted me to hit, and get there with the best combination of pace and tyre life. Ultimately that is the best way to get to the chequered flag. Obviously you put a lot of faith in the pit wall. The guys are helping you to work out what level of pace you run at, and also balancing the car at the pit stops was important, working with the guys on the front wing. We made quite a big adjustment at the first stop after my first stint and then I was much happy with the car in the second and third stints.

    Q: (Manuel Franco – AS) Fernando and Sebastian, is the second victory for Mark and second in the championship a surprise for you?

    FA: No, not really. I think Mark had a difficult season last year with a little bit too big a difference than normal with Sebastian, but in 2010 he was leading the championship until Korea so he’s not new in this position of fighting for the World Championships. This year, with all the tricky conditions and all the different winners we saw in this strange championship so far, I think Mark is good with those difficulties.

    SV: Not much to add. Obviously I have the advantage in that he’s in the same team so I can see what he’s doing but I don’t think it’s a surprise.

    Q: (Flavio Vanetti – Corriere Della Sera) Fernando, you told us about your mixed feelings: are you more worried to have lost seven points to Mark or you will maybe be more happy to have gained on Sebastian?

    FA: I think at the moment, as far as I’m leading, I’m more happy than worried. If Mark was leading the championship, I would be worried about losing another seven points, but at the moment, the weekend in general has been fantastic for us, because we left Valencia with maybe an emotional win, a lot of points in our pocket, compared to our rivals in the championship and we arrived at Silverstone, a completely different circuit, we didn’t know how the car was performing here. We had a very difficult qualifying for everybody yesterday and we survived that qualifying with pole position and today we also had a tricky race. We didn’t know what the weather was doing and I think the car performed well, we avoided any contact, any accidents that might happen at the start or in some battles. We are again bringing home more points than we probably expected, because when we arrived on Thursday, if someone had told us that we would leave on Sunday with 18 points again, I think we would have been very happy.

    Q: (Ted Kravitz – Sky) Is it Federer you’re going for Sebastian?

    SV: Yes.

    Q: (Ted Kravitz – Sky) There was a message on the radio that you should use Torque Five or something like that. Was there a technical reason why you didn’t have Mark’s pace today, and looking to your home race in Germany, what are your thoughts on that, a race that I don’t think you’ve won?

    SV: No, we didn’t have any problems. When you face your stint, you know roughly how many laps you want to do etc.d and you try to manage the tyres at their best and you try to use the tools that you have in the car. Obviously you can change your front wing settings at the pit stop, but other than that, once you are out on the circuit, you haven’t got that much to play with. You can play a little bit with the diff, obviously adjust your driving and adjust the mapping from the engine point of view. It’s hard to bring it down to lap time, but it’s just more driver comfort, what you prefer at the time.

    And yeah, obviously I’m looking forward to the next race, looking forward to Germany. It should be a very good one for us. I feel the car is picking up speed, so I definitely feel happier since the last race. This one… I think we struggled last year here, in particular. Ferrari had the upper hand so I think this year we had a much better balanced car in that regard. So it seems we are on the right track so let’s see if I succeed this year. It’s a race like every other. Sure it would be very special to win, but I don’t score more points just by winning my home race.

    Q: (Mark Fogarty – Auto Action ) Fernando, if there is a change in your team next year, would you like to have Mark as your teammate?

    FA: I don’t know. I think it’s just imaginary pictures. I need to put something on my shoes to be a little bit taller. That would be the only thing if I changed teammates. For the rest, it doesn’t matter. I would be happy with any teammate. I say again, I’m extremely happy with Felipe. Today, again, he showed the performance that he can do, with a normal race, trouble free etc. We will see what the team decides.

    Q: (Don Kennedy – Hawkes Bay Today) Mark, does today’s result make a difference to where you might drive next year, given that you’ve got number two on your cap and that seemed like a number one drive?

    MW: It helps my situation to stay in Formula One. At the start of the year I didn’t have a contract, I’m pushing to get a contract for next year. Going reasonably well, got a few points, a couple of wins and I will work very hard to try and stay in Formula One next year. So, the answer is no.

    Ends

  • Tough outing for McLaren in qualy

    Silverstone (UK), 7 July 2012: McLaren endured a tough outing in qualifying for the British Grand Prix with Jenson Button failing to make it out of Q3 and Lewis Hamilton finishing eighth in the top-10 shoot-out.

    Button struggled in the opening phase of Q1 and as the clock ticked down to the end of the session found himself in the drop zone. However, after pitting for a second set of intermediate tyres in the closing minutes he suddenly found some pace and looked on course to jump up the timesheet, according to an FIA press note.

    But as he neared the end of his lap, Marussia’s Timo Glock spun exiting the final corner and came to rest across the grid. The yellow flags came out and Button’s lap was compromised. He ended up 18th and out of the following two sessions.

    “It felt completely different [on the second set of tyres],” he said. “I came out of the pits and could actually get heat into the tyres straight away and it felt good, whereas with the first set I came out of the pits and had front shuddering and just couldn’t get fronts up to temperature. The story of my year, really.

    “I gained almost 1.7s according to my dash compared to the previous lap time, which wouldn’t have just got me in [to Q2], it would’ve given us the quickest lap time,” he added. “It’s a pity but it just wasn’t meant to be.”

    Hamilton, meanwhile, scrambled through the rain-hit second segment to make it into the top-10 shootout. However, in the final session he too had difficulty in getting heat into the tyres and finished eighth, almost two seconds adrift of pole position winner Fernando Alonso.

    “It was difficult, it is always is qualifying in the wet, but we really struggled. For some reason the tyres in Q3 wouldn’t switch on,” Hamilton said. “The extremes worked really well, then I came in because I thought it was drying and that the intermediates would give us the best grip but I was just sliding like crazy.

    “I can’t for the life of me understand why the tyres didn’t switch on there,” he added. “It’s very rare that I can’t get my tyres working. I was pushing and pushing and there was no grip.”

    Both drivers, however, said they were confident of better performances in tomorrow’s race.

    “The car is quicker than what we did,” he said. “We’re not far away. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the front row but we can still push through tomorrow. From eighth, everything is still possible.”

    Button, too, was upbeat about his chances.

    “We don’t get that many tyres, so this could actually be a good thing,” he said of his failure to get out of Q1. “If tomorrow’s wet – which we think it’s going to be – then we haven’t put as much mileage on the tyres. You’ve got to take the positives, because it was a very unlucky session.”

  • Kimi on P6; Mixed day for Lotus

    Silverstone (UK), 7 July 2012: While Lotus have looked on the pace this weekend, qualifying problems leave them starting sixth and ninth for the British Grand Prix here on Sunday.

    Kimi Räikkönen qualified sixth, and was to a small extent helped by the conditions which limited the damage done by him having a KERS failure as qualifying began. Romain Grosjean, however, never got to show his potential in Q3. Having made it through the truncated Q2 with good pace, the Frenchman spun off towards the end of that session and was unable to participate in Q3 with his car being recovered to the pits. He therefore qualified tenth but will start ninth after Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg took a gearbox penalty, according to a Press Release from FIA.

    “We’re in sixth place which is certainly not a disaster but we could have done better,” concluded Räikkönen. “We made a slightly wrong decision by using the full wet [in Q3] and I only had one lap in the restarted final qualifying session with the intermediates, otherwise I think it was possible to have gone faster. The weather makes it a bit tricky for everybody. It’s not easy, especially with the spray and this is even more difficult in race conditions when everyone is fighting for the same piece of track. On the plus side for the fans, it’s good fun to watch, even if it’s not the nicest weather if you’re in a grandstand.”

    Alan Permane, Lotus’s director of trackside operations conceded that, given the conditions, the tyre choice was a biggest issue than the KERS for Räikkönen. “In the wet conditions we experienced, the lack of KERS would have cost him a couple of tenths. With the KERS functioning it could have been possible to be a position further forwards on the grid. That said, being on the correct tyres and crossing the line to be the last driver on a flying lap would have yielded far more time. We took advantage of the rain delay to change everything we could to rectify the KERS issue, but were unable to do so in the time available. We don’t expect it to be an issue in tomorrow’s race.”

    Grosjean’s self-inflicted problem was easier to diagnose. “It’s frustrating and I’m very sorry for the team as it looks like we had a strong car, but sometimes mistakes happen,” he said. “My lap was not much different from the previous lap but it was different enough for me to go off and the car went backwards into the gravel and then it was stranded. It was very slippery. We deserved better, but we will do our best tomorrow to gain positions to get some good points. It will be a long race and starting position doesn’t mean as much if there are variable conditions. There’s also a benefit from not making it into Q3 as I have a fresh set of intermediate tyres.“

    ends

  • Parthiva 11th in F2 at Spa

    Spa Francorchamps, 24 June 2012: Indian racing driver Parthiva Sureshwaren finished Race 2 of the FIA Formula Two (F2) Championship at Spa Francorchampsin in 11th position after the race was red-flagged just into 3 laps due to severe wet and unsafe conditions. Parthiva passed 4 cars on the third lap and crossed the finish line in 7th place but Red Flag rules take results on the previous lap thereby pushing him to 11th position. Parthiva had earlier finished Race 1 also in 11th position.

    The weekend started off very strongly for the Indian as he set the 4th fastest time in the Friday Practice session, his highest position all season. For the first race of the weekend he qualified in 10th position after making a mistake on flying lap. He had a tough start to the race fell back to 12th position before overtaking PlamenKralev& Max Snegirev to be in a points scoring position. He then fell to 11th position on the final lap when Chinese driver David Zhu got past him.

    Qualifying for Race 2 started with a dry track with Parthiva yet again qualifying in 10th position, ahead of Championship contender MatheoTuscher. With dark clouds looming the race was always going to be a wet one. Due to the adverse weather conditions, the race was started behind the safety car. Parthiva passed Hector Hurst and Dino Zampiarelli on the third lap as cars were falling by the wayside. However, with visibility deteriorating, the race director was forced to deploy the red flag and suspend the race for driver safety.

    Unfortunately, the 40-minute time limit expired before conditions improved with the result declared final and drivers awarded half points. Due to the regulations the classification was taken from the lap before the red flag came out.

    Parthiva showed real pace this weekend but was unfortunate to finish just outside the points in both races.Parthiva said,“I had one of my best starts to this weekend when I finished 4th in practice. The car felt really good and I was really confident going into qualifying. I made a mistake on my fast lap which left me in 10th position, which was a shame since we could have been in the Top 6. In the race I struggled with my rear tyres and ended up just outside the points.”

    “While qualifying was run in dry conditions we always knew the race was going to be wet. For the first time this season the car felt comfortable in the wet and I seemed to have more grip than the guys around me. I managed to move up to 7th on the third lap while other cars were struggling to stay on track. When the race was red flagged I was happy I could at least move up to 7th but was later told that results would be based on the previous lap. It is a shame but am really optimistic for the rest of the season after our performance at Spa.” added Parthiva.

    ends

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    Parthiva Sureshwaren finishes 11th in both races at Spa on Sunday. Photo Adrenna

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